Peacock Spiders - ridiculously awesome!

7 comments:

jsd
said...

Truly beautiful and bizarre.

Spiders are greatly underappreciated.

When I was working in mangroves in the Northern Territory, Oz, I came across an area with the tiny (about the width of your little finger's fingernail) but spectacular [female]Gasteracantha westringi. In fact (and despite the protests of the publisher) it made the cover of my book on mangroves...

(2) Warning coloration -- as in I'm poisonous don't eat me... ...But then why not the males also? I was photographing a related spider Gasteracantha cancriformis in the Bimini mangroves once. here

I moved it on a twig and a fearless anolis lizard immediately rushed over and tried to eat it. It made off with the spider in its mouth before I could see if it was successful. So much for the warning coloration.

And you don't know spiders until you've had to use the 'long-drop' on a deserted atoll, on a dark night when the weak moonlight makes a million little pair of green eyes stare up at you, daring you to sit, bare-assed inches from legions of canes spiders. THAT is knowing spiders. Not that I had to do that; um, but yeah, I did, nightly for an entire field season.

JSD: yes I would agree with aposematism as the most likely explanation for the colors - the more as there is marked sexual dimorphism, with the females inhabiting nets and being highly visible (and thus vulnerable) whereas the drab male appear to be hiding away in the underbrush when not visiting the ladies for some kinky bondage.

Selkie tu quoque?Looks like there would be a niche for a blog targeting arachnophiles! :)What can I say... sitting bare-assed surrounded by them creepy stalking spiders sounds, for lack of a better word, kinda Bizzarre?

'After several cautious approaches, males approach females, become strapped down with silk from the female, and copulate. Mating may take 35 minutes or more. After mating, the male remains on the female's web. Mating may occur repeatedly.'